Our sports reporter adds attitude and brings a different flavor to his sports coverage.

Fans quietly cheer as Devin Hester’s role on Chicago Bears is reduced

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By Jay Taft

Jay Taft adds attitude and brings a different flavor to his sports coverage. In his 10-plus years at the Rockford Register Star, he has managed to sprinkle in his own style of reporting while dealing with a wide variety of sports. While breaking
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Jay Taft adds attitude and brings a different flavor to his sports coverage. In his 10-plus years at the Rockford Register Star, he has managed to sprinkle in his own style of reporting while dealing with a wide variety of sports. While breaking down youth and high school athletics (from pint-sized football to prep girls swimming), all manners of college sports, extreme and action sports and now the Chicago Bears, Taft likes to tell the entire story, leaving nothing to the imagination.

Devin Hester got his chance; in fact, most believe the leash was way too long.

And now, the once great returnman will no longer spend time as a wide receiver, and maybe, just maybe, he can get back to being that great returnman again.

"I’ll make it clear, because I have been asked that a number of times," new Bears head coach Marc Trestman said Tuesday, just after the team’ first minicamp under his direction. "Devin is going to focus on being our returner."

So, there it is, the Hester-to-wide-receiver experiment — one that lasted way too long for some Bear fans — appears to have ended with the new regime.

"What a relief," Bears fan John Burke said when he heard the news while sitting along the road outside the Bears’ complex waiting for autographs Tuesday.

Hester, who held out in 2008 training camp while looking for No. 1 wide receiver money, got his wish, but has fallen short on his promises since. The NFL’s record-holder for combined return TDs (now stuck at 18) did not return one for a score in either 2008 or ’09, and then he fell short numerous times again last year.

His best year as a dual receiver-returner threat came in 2010, when he had four receiving touchdowns, three punt-return TDs and led the NFL with 35.6 yards per kickoff return. But in 2012, it all came crashing down as he averaged 8.3 yards per punt return, 25.9 per kickoff return and caught 23 passes for 242 yards and one touchdown. When Lovie Smith was fired as head coach, Hester insisted he was contemplating retirement.

He’s back, but with a role similar to the one he started with. The plan for him now is to spend all of his time with special teams coordinator Joe DeCamillis, and the rest of the special-team’s-only guys.

"When we’re in an offensive meeting, he’ll be with Joe," Trestman explained. "He’ll be with Pat (Mannelly). He’ll be with Robbie (Gould) and the kickers and he’ll be spending time totally focused in on being the best returner in the National Football League."

Though the Bears have not ruled out working Hester back into the offense at some point, they have never breached the subject of a Hester-package (a term coined with last year’s coaching staff) or anything remotely close.

Instead, they want him to get back to being a returnman that strikes fear in his opponents, and one that forces teams to kick away from him instead of rolling the dice when he’s hot.

"He’s got to be the returner for him to be here, and once that is locked into place, which we expect that it will, then we’ll see where it goes from there. But we made a collective decision organizationally, I talked with the guys who have been here. Phil (Emery) and I had a long conversation about it as well," Trestman added. "Just talking to Devin, we’re going to let him get back to doing what he does best first, and then when that’s all in place, then we’ll see if we need to or if we’re in a position to be able to incorporate him into doing more things."